My Secret, Love
by AnHeiressofaSOLDIER
Summary: Returning home, Sora discovers the dolls he'd put in the boat model on his ceiling that were supposed to represent Kairi and himself. He then-in realizing he and Riku had somewhat been objectifying Kairi-opts to give the doll to Kairi, so she can choose her own destiny. After they both meet with Riku, they decide to make a cake to honor the Nobodies, but Kairi is hiding things.


**My Secret, Love**

It had been a week since Sora had come home: a week since he'd thought he'd be trapped in the Realm of Darkness with Riku forever—and thought that they may even have to become the element there.

But Kairi's light had eventually won out and brought them both back home to Destiny Islands.

And while Sora did his poor mom a solid, by cleaning a green shirt and pair of tan shorts that had been on his floor all this time, he decided that he was still so very grateful to Kairi for what she had done.

It wasn't so much so that he was amazed by the power she had—though it did sometimes keep him up at night, just wondering what all his Princess of Heart friend could do that he'd never known about—but rather the careful words she had chosen in her poem to him.

She had treated the written word as if it were a canvas, in fact. And the end result of her hard work had instantly made Sora feel so much faith and hope in that moment, that it had almost seemed like Kairi was right there with him in reading her pure feelings to him.

And it was with this particular thought in mind—while he continued to think about how much he loved Kairi, he would admit—that Sora noticed the two small dolls that he'd put into a boat hanging from his ceiling, the night his adventure had begun.

Blushing, as he stalked up to the ship model, Sora recalled how he'd imagined the sock figures as Kairi and himself.

It had mainly been after he'd won that race against Riku. And having been a sore loser, Riku had then decided that their sprint against each other had had nothing to do with Kairi and sharing a paopu fruit with her after all.

But Sora _had_ wanted the race to mean exactly that—there was no point in lying to himself was there?—but at the same time, he hadn't countered Riku on his easy dismissal because it had been at that moment that Sora had realized he and Riku had kind of been objectifying Kairi.

…Not that that knowledge had kept him from looking up at the ship and the dolls wistfully on the night of fate, as he'd remembered how she'd asked just him to go with her on the raft.

"I feel a little guilty about all of this now, though," Sora admitted to the "Kairi" doll, as he scuffed his shoes on the blue floor in an awkward manner. "In fact—for all I know—karma got back at me for wanting to leave out Riku, by making it so you were with me the whole time, Kairi… But your heart had to leave your body for that to happen. So, I- I'm going to do better now."

Sora had meant to stand on his tiptoes to reach the miniature "Kairi"—for he wanted to give it to his favorite redhead, so that she could make decisions about her own destiny—but something stopped him.

The door to his room swung wide open, and standing there over the threshold was Kairi herself.

Just behind her, Sora could see his mom retreating back down the stairs—showing that she had been the one to open his door and not the Princess—and even though Sora was so very thrilled to see his best friend that he'd missed for so long, he had to admit that his mom could've at least knocked before ushering Kairi towards him!

But then the brunet saw Kairi—really saw her, with the starfish she had in her slightly curled hair and the pink beach towel that she had wrapped around her waist—and he decided that someone as amazing as she was should never be obligated to wait for him.

There was another time when she'd looked gorgeous like this, too: when she'd gone to a festival with him one time, but had slightly stubbed her toe on the way out and he'd had to carry her the rest of the way.

Honestly, it was a pretty good memory.

"Just give me a minute, Kairi," Sora said, smiling at her. "I just need to grab my own towel—and a beach ball, maybe—and then we can go and meet Riku."

But before Sora could turn around towards his closet to get those articles, Kairi picked up the doll based on her that Sora had very much been trying to hide.

She even almost seemed transfixed by it.

"Kairi?" Sora asked, taking a step forward to put a hand on his companion's shoulder. The look that had come over her face worried him, as it resembled the way she'd gazed at him before phasing through him that time.

"Sorry, Sora," Kairi spoke up then, shaking her head to seemingly clean it of cobwebs. "It's just that… Do you mind at all if I keep this? It's somewhat reminding Naminé of her captivity, so her being able to have it—and to dress it up and give it a nice home—might be therapeutic for her."

And as Kairi ended up smiling at Sora then—her hand even coming up to touch his own, almost—he found that he never could've refused her in that moment. Whether it was Kairi or Naminé within Kairi, what difference did it make on which one of them had the spoken ownership over the figure? It was no skin off Sora's back at all.

So shrugging with a smirk of his own, before moving to put his hands behind his head, he answered with an upbeat attitude, "Go right ahead! To tell the truth, I have a lot to make up for when it comes to Naminé. In fact, if I thought she could hear me now, I'd even tell her just that. So if you think this present my mom got me in the past will cheer her up, then you've got my vote for this plan."

And before Sora could even process what was happening, Kairi had leaned towards him and pecked him on the cheek in some kind of thanks, he assumed.

Recollections of what Sora had seen Kairi draw on the cave wall came flooding into his mind then.

He was very close to talking to her about it, but before Sora could find a way to turn his words into poetry himself, Kairi had already stepped outside.

Sora, meanwhile, stood flabbergasted and blinking—tracing the exact place where Kairi's lips had just left him, and then opting to jump up and down in glee.

…

Sora ended up finding Riku on a grassy cliff—overlooking a part of the ocean that had become closed off at parts, and looked much more like a large, square swimming pool now because of it.

There was a pink cast that always ended up surrounding the sea here, that wasn't Sora's favorite. But when Kairi became inspired by seeing that color and came up with a brilliant idea, Sora found that he'd never been so thankful to that shade in his life.

"We should make a cake," she muttered, leaning over the precipice as Riku was doing, to maybe get a better look at all the people that were milling about beneath them. "A cake with figures of Roxas and Naminé on them—and we can use it as a sort of birthday celebration for them, if you will—because I think… I think that might make both of them happy as they rest within Sora and me, I think."

At that, Riku scoffed. And though Sora usually would've been hurt for Kairi's sake at that, he had to admit that he was the tiniest bit baffled by the idea himself. Kairi spoke as if she meant to give the Nobodies birthdays that they didn't have, but didn't they actually have some birth dates to themselves?

"It's not like I can't understand where you'd come up with this idea—with what looks like little wedding cake toppers going about their business beneath us, but are you sure that Roxas and Naminé are even still present, Kairi?"

Riku didn't sound hateful about the idea, Sora noted, just curious. And the spiky-haired teen remembered how Riku had said that when they got home, that Sora could thank Naminé all he wanted, so it seemed Riku wasn't opposed to giving Naminé some recognition, at least.

Idly, though, Sora had to wonder if maybe the reason Riku seemed hung-up about this idea… was because he himself didn't have a Nobody and was maybe somewhat jealous. But surely he was glad that he'd avoided that inevitable tragedy?

"I-" Kairi began to counter, while wearing a slight frown on her face.

And there was something about Kairi's expression and tone that Sora couldn't understand then. She seemed to be holding something back, though Sora couldn't at all imagine why.

She quickly ended up recovering, however. Clapping her hands together, before giving Riku a somewhat judging look, she spoke this, "Something 'wedding-esque' wasn't my intention, Riku, but if you want to see it as some sort of relationship thing for them—if Roxas and Naminé don't object—then far be it from me to dissuade you. They did want to be together every day, after all."

Sora blushed, and discreetly wondered if their Nobodies liking each other at all meant that Kairi maybe returned his feelings—maybe even with something strong and real—but Sora shoved the thought aside and focused on how exciting this all was!

Stepping forward—so he could get a better look at the people below them himself, though nearly toppling over the mountain, and tripping over Riku and Kairi some as he did so—he told his friends his idea:

"If you really want to create some kind of cake for Roxas and Naminé, Kairi, I'd be more than willing to help out! I actually learned how to cook while out adventuring. Kind of had to, since we were always scraping to get by and didn't know if or when we'd come near any towns.

"I still missed cake, though, so a few times we convinced some locals to let us make it in some city kitchens. Hehe."

Sora's friends were clearly surprised by this news. No doubt they knew of how Sora's mom had had to cook for him all the time before.

But eventually Riku got to his feet—some grass swaying and cutting into his ankles as he moved, it looked like—and announced:

"Sounds like a plan, then. Sora, you bake the cake. I can do some decorations, because I know a lot about ice magic from using darkness and I can't imagine ic _ing_ can be that much different. And Kairi can put her Naminé skills to use—without alerting her to this surprise, of course—and draw the pair of Nobodies. It sounds good to me."

Sora wasn't too sure on whether Riku was being sarcastic with some of that or not, but with his eyes alight as he headed off after Kairi—who had a countenance that seemed to say she'd find a way to get this done no matter what—Sora thought that they probably at least had seventy-five percent of all this under control.

If Riku was lying about helping out, then he and Kairi would account for that problem when they got to it, for sure.

…

The three's attempt to bake the dessert resulted in some highly amusing things, as far as Sora was concerned.

They ended up going to a kitchen in a supermarket, which was cool enough. But when Sora realized how old-fashioned his world's bakeries were, he ended up having to send Donald a message in a bottle while the trio resigned to wait a few days to get started.

This was because in having been to much more advanced worlds, Sora now refused to just use one massive bowl for everything, the main four ingredients, and an ancient oven to make his favorite food, thank you very much.

They probably didn't have much time to be in the kitchen anyway, so getting everything done as fast as possible (by getting Donald to tell Sora how to create a microwave through magic, for one thing) really was the best bet for them.

Riku and Kairi both complained about Sora's commissioning his wizard friend to make his life easier, by saying that he was being a baby and a lazy bum as ever.

And Kairi even made a good case in explaining that the Island had developed more than Sora knew in his absence, and that now they even had working cranes, so surely they could make a freakin' cake with such advancements.

…And yet when Donald's response finally came to Sora, and he could know how to use his magic accordingly to get what he wanted, he could tell that his best friends were impressed.

Kairi seemed most interested in the pastry chef hats he ended up creating, though. Apparently the idea that a certain kind of cook would wear a special kind of cap was hilarious to her.

She then begged Sora to try and make such a hat out of thalassa shells, and he had to playfully tell her to focus.

He saw how it was.

Kairi was joking that he was now the artistic one in doing all of this, instead of her having the monopoly on that category.

Honestly, her teasing was pretty cute to Sora. It always had been…

Riku then batted his eyelashes at Kairi—in trying to show her how to woo Sora to get what she wanted, Sora assumed, for which he scowled at his older friend—and told her if she pestered Sora enough, he'd probably at least try and paint the thalassa shell charm onto the cake for her.

Sora then had to resist the urge to chase Riku around with a rolling pen.

Finally, the three friends got the cake up and running.

Sora was putting all the ingredients together into a bowl, and then mixing them up.

He was even making sure to put them in the proper order—as most people would've just forgotten to do that, he wagered—and Kairi, meanwhile, was measuring things out and handing them to Sora when he asked for them.

Somewhat oddly, Kairi seemed to be using a knife instead of a spoon-to get things like butter out of its container and into a measuring cup—which was all well and good, Sora supposed, but every now and then he'd catch her casting almost a sad look onto the metal.

Sora winced; was Kairi trying to hint that she could handle a battle just fine—as she clearly had mastery over these knives—and that she should be able to go with them on their next journey?

He sent a look Riku's way, as he folded some blueberries into the batter, but Riku didn't look like he'd noticed anything amiss.

Instead, Riku seemed much too interested in the microwave that Sora had magicked up—maybe he'd never seen one before in his own world visits?—and trying to melt some more chocolate chips with it.

Sora sighed.

"You know," Kairi said, as she began fiddling with some gum paste to make the Roxas and Naminé designs, Sora supposed. "I think I'm going to try and make the two of them have accordion like spines, that way they'll be able to reach towards each other even if they're far apart."

Sora and Riku blinked at that, and Sora found himself feeling startled that Kairi—the most selfless person he knew—would now suggest, like Riku had earlier, that Roxas and Naminé liked each other and always wanted to be close together. Not just with each other, but close.

And them reaching for each other… Didn't that sound like what Kairi and himself had gone through while being separated at Kingdom Hearts that first time?

But in just a quick instance, Sora found himself wondering if he'd imagined the whole thing, for the ginger just quietly continued to work at the lovely figures she'd begun at and wasn't touching their backs at all.

Her faux-Roxas and Naminé were quite impressive—and in seeing how good she was at crafts, Sora began pondering if making trinkets like this were really where her talents lied, perhaps even beating out writing for her.

And, of course, Kairi was also wonderful at drawing; Sora smiled in remembering the etching of his face that she'd done on the secret place wall, as well as some of her other sketches.

"You know what you should do…" Riku suddenly said, surprising Sora and Kairi both as he apparently gave up on messing with the mysterious "mike" and just settled on eating the chocolate chips as they were. "Take that doll you've been carrying around, Kairi, put some of this fondant stuff on it and make _it_ a model that way."

Kairi was puzzled, Sora could clearly see it on her face. But for that matter, so was he!

As Sora looked at Riku quizzically, Kairi managed to put both of their confusion into words: "But I love the doll baby, Riku. Why would I wanna wreck the poor dear like that? Everything we put on the cake is supposed to be edible, anyway?

"Unless… Unless you're thinking of that poor, deceased girl from the Land of Dragons that you told me about; are you- are you saying we should smush some cake onto my doll to let her think—wherever she's looking down on us from—that her favorite thing in the world at least survived, when she didn't?"

At once, Sora found that he was extremely upset—however he knew ruining their happy mood together had been neither Riku or Kairi's intention.

He'd almost forgotten the little doll Mulan and Shang had found after the Huns had burnt down that village, and probably for good reason.

As a whole, Sora did his best to repress painful and trigger-type memories. And though he'd never really liked dolls at all—instead, he'd been a bit of a jerk when he was younger and had ribbed Kairi a little bit for wasting time with them—when he'd seen that little plaything near the Tung Shao Pass, he'd felt so much rage and had decided then and there that if he could protect all girls and their favorite toys, he would.

Sora had not been aware that Riku had known about any of this. He supposed he probably should've, as Riku had been skulking around the Land of Dragons, but he had remained none the wiser.

As Sora was pulled back to the present—with tears streaming down his face as he was—he saw that his feelings must have been catching.

Riku was clenching his fists at his sides angrily, whilst he decidedly looked away from everyone.

And Kairi… with water droplets dotting her eyes, was admitting something now. "Sora, I think I was objectifying this doll like you did once, and I… Riku was right. I wanted this to be a wedding cake, because through this façade for our Nobodies, I could at least _pretend_ that there was a part of you that wanted to stay with me, and were at the very least thinking about it."

"Kairi-" Sora began, frozen in shock. It was true that he'd somewhat been suspecting this, but he'd been hoping he'd been wrong. And now to have Kairi admit this so surely, he was at a loss on what to do. He wanted to go up to her—to embrace her and to reassure her—but he couldn't find the words to say that would make this better.

Riku seemed to have it all under control, however, as he himself gave Kairi a quick hug as she cried a little.

"Listen, Kairi," he told her, a hand stroking her hair as he did so. "We love you and never want to leave you. If you could go with us on safer missions, we'd take you in a heartbeat. But the fact is… you're far too important to both of us to put you in harm's way. We'll always come back to you if we have to leave, we promise—even if I have been stupid before—but I… I get the sense that we might soon learn that you're more important than you think, and that's even more reason to keep you safe. Right, Sora?"

Somewhere in the process of Sora becoming completely jealous that Riku also seemed to have a gift with words that he himself could never dream of, Sora had let his hand fall to the stovetop beneath him and had caused massive amounts of flour to rise up onto his face that way.

So he must've looked like a real piece of work when Kairi suddenly turned his way, but if nothing else it succeeded in making Kairi laugh some, which Sora was glad for.

"What Riku said," he told her. "And you know what? If we get called away again, I'm even thinking of bringing you with us this time, Kairi… I'll have to make sure nothing crazy is happening, of course. But I always want you right by my side, and if there's a way we can manage it… Know that my brain's already in gear trying to work the specifics of it out. I promise.

"But if you want to, we _can_ still make this romantic cake for Roxas and Naminé. I'm sure they won't mind. Just know that you don't need to go through them to find a way to mean to me. You always mean a lot to me, Kairi."

But she was already shaking her head in the negative, before sending smiles both Riku and Sora's way.

And as she began speaking, she seemed to be trying to do exactly what Riku had said—changing the look of the doll that Sora had given her to match the doll that that dead little girl had lost. "Thank you. Both of you. I realize- I realize now that I was being selfish. We're all only human, right?" Kairi asked, as she rubbed at her eyes. "But I'm good now. _I_ promise. And now I know that we have something better to do."

And so the three friends made a cake in tribute to the kid, and then took it to a shelter to feed to struggling people.

They even ended up giving the doll—after thinking they'd honored the Land of Dragons child enough—to another little female that seemed glad for it, cake sliding off of the toy and all.

Hand-in-hand, the three friends relished in saving the world together in this simpler way for a change.

And the entire world of Destiny Islands, with the sun lighting everything up so strongly with its rose cast, seemed all the brighter because of it.


End file.
